The Movie Weekend

Another work week done with and another movie weekend begins! Pickings are pretty slim for new flicks to check out with only five new ones hitting the theaters and three of those being all areas releases. Let’s dive in and see what’s hot and new!

Fast & Furious 6 (PG13)

The first of our three nationwide releases is Fast & Furious 6. Surely you’ve seen some commercials for this whether it be on TV, your PC or Mac, or your smartphone. Whenever a new Fast & the Furious comes out you can expect an advertising bombardment to get it out.

So what’s new this time around? For one thing Chris Morgan and Justin Lin have moved away from the heavy car racing theme that built the franchise. It’s actually a relief as it was getting old fast…who am I kidding, it got old by the third installment. There’s only so many times that you can run with underground racing as the backdrop of your film. Seriously, the authorities haven’t been able to catch at least some of these pockets of street racers?

…it’s like they might as well formed an actual league.

Returning to what’s new in the sixth installment, the main character—Dominic Toretto (played by Vin Diesel)—and his gang have retired after the events of Fast Five. A U.S Diplomatic Security Service agent (played by Dwayne Johnson) is up for clearing the gang’s name and letting them return home—if they help him take out a mercenary group which is co-headed by Toretto’s presumed dead lover (played by Rodriguez).

So it’s still firmly in the action realm, they weren’t going to make Fast & Furious 6 about racing space ship, dragons, or zombies. The story on paper isn’t the most innovative one. How many action films have you see with a group taking down another group—and on top of that a U.S military or agent hiring or asking said group for help? John Matrix took out a group in Commando by himself, mind you. Chuck Norris always showed up to ruin the party. Chow Yun Fat took out who knows how many triad members in his films. Let’s not forget Charles Bronson running roughshod on gang members.

The point is; nothing all that new here aside from a departure from what they’ve been doing. The same core cast members in the majority of the films are there and The Rock gets another action film in for the first half of the year. Moving on.

The third entry into The Hangover series debuted last night making this a thrillogy. The reviews have mainly put The Hangover Part III in “darker” more action oriented territory. Having checked it out myself, the reviews are largely right. While it does have its funny, trademark Hangover moments, it does come off as more action packed than about a crazy time in Las Vegas and a series of comedic misadventures. Nothing else to really say about it, if you’re a fan of the series you might want to check it out just to complete it, other than that it’s a tossup.

Epic (PG)

I’ve never been too big a fan of the CGI/Pixar/Dreamworks animated films. Sure I enjoyed Toy Story, Finding Nemo, and the animation for Star Wars: The Clone Wars, but that’s it. What makes it odd is that this was actually what I majored in; Pixar and similar animated films was a big thing while I was learning computer animation. It just never excited me and made me go “Wow! Are you guys seeing this? This is all just so incredible!”

At any rate, Epic is a film based on the children’s book The Leaf Men and the Brave Good Bugs by William Joyce. It’s your standard good vs. evil with a fantasy setting tale. If you’ve seen any similar films, just substitute the talking birds, frogs, lobsters, brooms, fish or whatever for bugs. That aside, it’s sure to be a good movie for kids and the whole family to enjoy as well as CGI animation enthusiasts.

If you feel you might enjoy Epic, you might want to check out The Croods.

Iron Man 3, Pain & Gain, and The Great Gatsby don’t look to be going anywhere soon until the movie season really picks up. Even then expect Iron Man 3—which just headed over $1 billion—and The Great Gatsby to hang around within the upper half of the top 10 for a while. Star Trek Into Darkness seems to have underperformed falling short of its opening weekend projection by less than $30 million, but hey it was a good film and most seem to enjoy it. This brings us to…

Swift’s Picks

If you’re looking for action in your film, go with Iron Man 3, Star Trek Into Darkness, and Fast & Furious 6. Pain & Gain is a film worth looking into as well for action buffs. I’d suggest just going with Iron Man 3 and Star Trek Into Darkness period. Sure I keep suggesting Iron Man 3 and sure I keep saying it’s not a gamble since it’s such a good film, but nothing else particularly excites me in the theater at the moment.

The third place for my recommendations overall would be The Great Gatsby. It’s very well done.

James Swift Jr.
Starting with Kabir News in 2013, James has focused on tech, gaming, and entertainment. When not writing, he enjoys catching up on sci-fi and horror shows and comics. He can be followed on Twitter @MetalSwift.

Categories

Calendar

Archives

Archives

In order to find the past articles published by Kabir News please browse the archives above.

About Us

Kabir News is a dedicated news agency providing the latest news from all over the world. At KN we are trying to cover all the fields and bringing the latest and fresh news for our readers and subscribers.